Zoom Release Highlights: September 22, 2021

Guest post by Mike Speechley, Information Systems & Computing.

Zoom has a number of new changes that faculty and students may be interested in using. For help using any of these features, contact your LSP or help@isc.upenn.edu.

Meeting Features

Poll Access for Alternative Hosts: If you assign an alternative host to your meeting, the alternative host in the meeting will now have the additional in-meeting options to add or edit a poll, which launches the web portal to make the changes.
Stop Incoming Video: Users in a meeting can easily disable all incoming video through in-meeting controls. This may be done to preserve bandwidth for shared content, or to avoid mental fatigue from viewing multiple, active video participants.
Participant Attendance Status: If the host has the Google or Outlook calendar integration configured, Zoom will display a list of others invited to the meeting but not yet in attendance, allowing for quick checks if everyone is in attendance yet. Their invite response (Accepted, Declined, Maybe) is listed with their name and the host can easily invite them to the meeting from the participants panel.

Chat Features

Easier Emoji Access: After entering : and two or more letters, available emojis matching that description will be shown. For example, entering “:jo” will provide the following matching emojis: :joy:, :joy_cat:, :joystick:, :majong:, and :black_joker:
Rich Text Formatting Support: Enhanced rich text message capabilities allow for better chat messages formatting options. These options are available for composing a new message, replies, and editing messages. Expanded options for the desktop client include bold, italics, underlining, strikethrough, highlight and text color, font size, bulleted and numbered lists, hyperlinks, and indenting. Mobile apps will gain the ability to bold, italicize, strikethrough, underline, and create a bulleted or numbered list.
Quote Messages: Users can quote specific messages sent in a channel, which helps avoid confusion and eliminates the need for others to scroll up to view the initial question or message.